Congressman Tom Kean has once again showed his true color by his recent votes. And his color is orange.

First on February 6, he votes in favor of impeaching Homeland Security SecretaryAlejandro Mayorkas on charges that do not reach the high crimes and misdemeanor level that are required by the Constitution. The House (maybe we should call it the shed since members don’t need a full house to do the little meaningful work that they do) simply disagrees with President Biden’s immigration policies, and The Donald wants someone impeached because he was impeached (twice). Congressman Kean bowed to Emperor Trump and voted accordingly. That bill failed.

Then seven days later, he votes in favor of impeachment again. This action has no chance of passing the Senate, but Congressman Kean – like his fellow Shed Republicanschose to waste their time on this impeachment, rather than actually get some work done for the people of the 7th district.

More importantly, he stands with his fellow Shed Republicans in opposition to a Senate immigration bill, developed after months of bi-partisan negotiations, because Mr. Trump doesn’t want it to become law so that he can claim chaos at the border during election season. This bill would have provided aid to Ukraine, Israel, and Taiwan, in addition to providing the toughest immigration policies ever contemplated by the United States. Then Republican Shed leadership doesn’t even allow a vote on a standalone aid bill because they say it doesn’t contain any measures to strengthen immigration policies. Republicans like Mr. Kean can’t claim that they want immigration reform, and then not support immigration reform when it comes to a vote.

The worst part about the Shed Republicans inaction, however, is that in my opinion, it led straight to Mr. Trump’s friend Putin’s murder of Alexi Navalny in a Russian concentration camp. Putin saw that the United States – due to the Shed’s failure to provide aid to Ukraine – is weaking on Ukraine, and pounced. We will be left wondering if Congressman Kean and his fellow Republicans voted to provide aid to Ukraine if Putin would have seen the United States as backing away from our commitment and would have killed Mr. Navalny. And how much farther Rep. Kean’s complexion changes into an orange hue.

Bill Nierstedt Garwood